Passover is a lovely holiday that almost always involves a conversation about constipation.

But you know what? I don’t think that’s the reason I enjoy it so much.

I think it’s because we got engaged on the first night of Passover in 2008, and I have this priceless piece of art to remember that night:

In case you couldn’t tell, that’s Y celebrating his engagement to THE CLAW while THE CLAW ponders when bushy eyebrows will be in again and why she chose to spend her life with a mate with such large ears and no chin to speak of. Both Y and THE CLAW probably ate too much matzah and are constipated. It happens.

Y’s little brother painted this when he was ten based on a picture we took at the Passover seder.

Okay, not really. I just happened to have two toothbrush-related thoughts to share two days in a row.

Would you be surprised if Toothbrush Week was a thing, though? Everything has a day. Monday was National Peanut Butter and Jelly Day. I’m pretty sure today was national Let Your Dog Steal Your Used Q-Tip Day (at least, it was in our house). But I digress.

This post is actually about how time flies. About how I distinctly remember scribbling John Mayer lyrics in a notebook after Y brought his toothbrush to my apartment for the first time. She keeps a toothbrush at my place… as if I have the extra space.

Six years later we practically share a toothbrush. (We share the base of a Sonicare toothbrush. It’s not gross.) Sometimes, when we both finish flossing at the same time, we box each other out to achieve the greatest of victories: the first to use the toothbrush.

We’ve also become fluent in each other’s Toothbrush Language. Y has a bad habit of asking me questions while I’m brushing my teeth, and I have a bad habit of trying to answer him. Our biggest accomplishment happened this week, when Y understood my entire half of a long conversation composed of only mmm-mmms and exaggerated eyebrow movement.

He’ll come in handy as my interpreter on National Bring Your Toothbrush To Work Day. (April 29th! Mark your calendars!)

When we moved in over 3 and a half years ago, we set up two desks in our office. Since we were both students, we knew we’d be spending a lot of time at our desks. Naturally, we put them back to back.

Y’s desk was directly across the room from mine, facing the opposite wall. I can’t show it to you because he clearly doesn’t spend as much time on Pinterest as I do, and doesn’t care whether his area is blogworthy. Boys.

And that’s when I had my idea- my idea that could rival the cotton gin, bifocals, or the Baby-Sitters’ Club. If I had thought of it, oh, four years ago.

“We should push our desks together.”

“But we only have a few more months here.”

I’m convincing, and we did it anyway. It’s amazing. We realized we had wasted 3 and a half years not looking at each other, not having Ike underneath us licking both of our feet at the same time, and not watching porn because we were worried the other one could see it.

Just kidding about the porn.

Y was playing a computer game when I started taking pictures, and I demanded he turn it off. Because that’s the kind of wife I am. This is the kind of husband he is:

Since Y has been in medical school, he’s gotten several midnight emergency medical questions from family members. Symptoms have ranged from vomiting and diarrhea to Lyme Disease. Every time, he’s woken up and given patient, thoughtful answers, backed up with facts from whatever exclusive medical app he has access to.

Since Y has been in medical school, I’ve asked him several questions about my own health. Symptoms have ranged from random dizzy spells to shortness of breath. Every time, he’s looked at me with a scowl and said, “I don’t know. Ask a doctor!”

Have you ever heard the phrase “the shoemaker’s wife has no shoes”? I get it. I really do.

In the past few years, there are two instances I can think of when Y has been helpful in response to a medical issue or question I’ve had (not including the time I got brain freeze):

1. Y looked up from his textbook. “I know why you get scared so easily!” he announced, startling me.

“What are you talking about?” I asked, even though just that week he had accidentally scared me to the point that I almost killed him. We were running together, and near the end of our route he had slowed to a cool-down walk as I sped up for a sprint to the finish. A few seconds after I passed him, he snuck up next to me, startling me and causing me to reflexively hit him as hard as I could in the chest. I feel like I was one heartbeat off from inflicting commotio cordis.

“You have Jumping Frenchmen of Maine syndrome!”

“You definitely just made that up,” I said.

But in fact, he did not. Jumping Frenchmen of Maine syndrome is (assuming Y didn’t change the Wikipedia page to play a huge joke on me) a neurological disorder. The person who first described this disorder noted patients “reacting abnormally to sudden stimuli” including jumping, yelling, and hitting (all of which I’ve done). It was first observed in northern Maine, hence its awesome name.

I think I’m going to start writing this on any form that asks for my medical conditions. The gym I join when we move isn’t going to know what to do with me.

2. Yesterday, while watching a Rogaine commercial, I turned to Y. “Do you think,” I ruminated, “That if I smeared Rogaine on my face, I could grow a beard?”

Y’s expression turned serious. “The major compound in Rogaine is blablabla,” he said thoughtfully. “so that means bla bla bla bla. I think. Let me get my phone.” He returned a moment later with his trusty medical app. “bla bla bla bla. So, no.”

I’m still wondering why I often feel dizzy and get out of breath. But at least I know I can fall face first into a vat of Rogaine and be okay.

That ripped out magazine page in the center of the refrigerator was part of my gift from Y (the “this isn’t really a gift, but I decided to give it to you anyway because I thought it was neat” part). He randomly came across it while flipping through a 1968 Life magazine at an antique store.

Here’s what the text says:

Evening at home.Like many another courageous girl, she’s married her young doctor in the making. And now she shares with him those long, gruelling years of medical study and internship.

In a very real sense, they’re her years of preparation, too. For ahead stretches a lifetime of marriage to a man with whom… day or night, week-ends or holidays…the needs of patients will always come first.

You’ll find dedication, as well, among the men and women who carry on A.H. Robins pharmaceutical research. It keeps them persisting through months and years of discouragement. For it may take a thousand trials and experiments to achieve a single success… a single better medicine to help your doctors of today and your doctors of tomorrow.

Isn’t that funny? Here are my thoughts…

PS: this was the actual gift – a vintage earring holder ordered from Etsy.

After his fifth trip — at five days it was the longest so far — the boy is finally home, in his own shower, his own bed. The next flight is in just two days, and a good night’s sleep in his own bed is a must. He falls asleep as soon as his head hits the pillow, his stomach full from homemade chicken pot pie (and cramped from laughing at the girl’s botched haircut).

The girl falls asleep soon after, but is woken in the middle of the night by the boy’s tossing and turning. She opens an eye wearily as the boy rolls over, groans, and whispers in her ear.